Evening capital. (Annapolis, Md.) 1884-1910, 1887-09-26
THE RAILROAD MIND.
GROWING DEMAND FOR A NEW
KIND OF MENTAL APTITUDE.

Quickness to Act and q Patience to Mas
ter DotaiI-orIgin of Railway sIaugh-
ters-A Farmer Boys Fatal Nfistale-
Good Management.
The railway when it came into the
human world brought demand for a
new kind of mental force or aptitude.
The railway man from the president TO
the brakeman must possess q quiekness
to perceive, a quickne1S TO act and a
patience TO master detail; an omission Of
a task may cost great sums or may de-
stroy life. When u superintendent passes
over his road in private car and eX-
amines the track and bridges while he is
moving at the rate of thirty miles an
hour, lie is not necessarily a criminal, he
may be only an intellectual imbecile. lie
should be removed from railway service
and be commended TO the task of super
vision of an OK or pack horse service. One
day some men were moving weeds, nail.
ing up loose boards ana whitewashing at
a railway station, and confessed the mo-
tive of such industry was to be found in
the fact that the superintendent was to
pass along next day. These men all knew
the kind of lightning inspection that
nOttANA bS ny lLCil NliNll.
In the history of national banks one
can read the shallow import of the word
inspection, but there the mental weak
ness of an inspector costs the country
money and not life. For bank to fail i'll
a few days after having been pronounced
unusually sound is an event not wholly
unknown; but the depositors are not
killed nor mangled 1t is in railroad
work mental weakness assumes its most
dangerous shape. A facile, lax, easy
going mind may in the railway profession
become as fatal as can of dynamite or
an earthquake.
NEW FORM OF MIND.
Many railway slaughters have resulted
from the slowness of educational pro-
cesses. The new iron road has created q
demand for new form of mind, but it
cannot at once supply the demand Mr.
Galloway one of the most conscientious
and ideal railway men on the continent,
said once that each passenger train which
runs from Chicago to New York must pass
through the hands of 500 men who are wide
awake to each duty. When one ponders
upon this statement, and remembers how
difficult it is to find 500 capable men in n
single row, the wonder comes that train
ever passes over a /, 900 mile path without
Delng wrecked or nJured.
Why should the public, which cannot
inspect bank or milk can, rail at the
men who come only tolerably near in
specting a railway? The railway is help
ing to make q better kind Of brain, bat
brain is of slow growth. A celored man
was recently asked at what time the cars
passed his cabin, and his reply was that
they went north in the morning and south
in ba oft Tf 1oo1
to conception of such divisions of time
as 200 or 3:10 or 5:15, would be an educa-
tional task of no little weight. To give
such mortal a place upon railway
would be criminal, for if he did not kill
others he would soon kill himself.
Only last week one of these boys of the
farm, allured by false vanity to seek rail-
way work, met his death because of men
tai laxness. He was made switchman at
village station. The sole Of one shoe
became unsewed. Thus was he made IL
able to be thrown down He took the
risk from day to day. At last, as he set
switch and stepped quickly, his shoe
sole caught on spike head and death
came quickly. His method with his shoes
on the farm failed as a method for the
new surroundings.
QUACK RAILROAD MEN.
The educational power of the railway is
kept back by the pitiable truth that
many of its officials are not students of a
great art, but are only spectators in land
or stocks, when not absolute thieves.
| Quack railroad men are more numerous
than quack doctors. Good men are dis
charged to make room for favorites, and
thus fortunes aud life are placed at the
mercy of unframed minds In the army
colonel was displaced that some cousin
of the generals might have the position.
When the new colonel rode out to exercise
the boys at arms he told them ito do as
they had done yesterday"
The railway service is no doubt suffer
ing much from the presence of officials
who know more about money and luxury
than they know about bridges and road
beds. Under the rule of these captains
New York, and soon the bank account is
large and the road worn out and danger
Gus. The income is the main thing, the
art nothing.
Some roads are managed by railway art.
The president himself could run a locomo-
tive or construct a bridge or keep awake
at a switch. These roads are under the
control of the railway intellect, and not Of
the champagne and private car genius.
May the time soon come when so tremen-
doUs a thing as the railway shall be man
aged by the new kind of intellectual force
called railway brain.-David Swing in
Chicago Journal.